SEALING A TRIUMPH!

User Rating: / 0PoorBest When Triumph Motorcycles required a new seal within a three month lead time they turned to Pioneer Weston International, a division of ERIKS UK to develop and supply the seal.

The design and purchasing teams at Triumph Motorcycles needed help when extreme pre-production testing of prototypes of a new model revealed that enhanced sealing for the gearbox output shaft would improve performance and reliability.

Faced with the challenge of sourcing the custom designed and manufactured seal on a short time scale, the engineers at Triumph Motorcycles turned to an organisation which not only had proven expertise in seals, but also an excellent reputation for providing a fast response
Within just nine days of being asked by Triumph Motorcycles to quote for the project, PWI had submitted a detailed offer, including full engineering drawings. Triumph placed an initial development order almost immediately, and PWI worked with all possible speed to complete the design and to manufacture production samples. The seals were required to work continuously at temperatures in excess of 70?C in an oil-laden environment on a shaft rotating at up to 3000 rpm.

In its endeavours to proceed rapidly with the project, PWI was substantially assisted by having its own in-house materials laboratory and dynamic test facilities. This meant that the company was not dependent on the vagaries of external support and could, therefore, shorten development, evaluation and testing times significantly compared with other potential suppliers.

As a result, the first samples were produced less than three weeks after the original request for a quotation had been issued – due to close collaboration and concurrent engineering between Triumph and PWI. Working with these initial samples, PWI was able to confirm the dimensional tolerances of the seals, and also that the material used in their manufacture fully met the requirements of the application. The company then subjected the samples to rigorous validation test cycles, using its own in-house dynamic test rigs.

Three hundred hours of validation testing was completed and, at this point, the decision was taken to release products to Triumph Motorcycles so that it could carry out its own testing and evaluation. Validation testing at PWI was, however, continued to a full 600 hours to ensure the full conformity of the seals.

Thanks to the combination of expertise, attention to detail and exceptional resources of the PWI team, the seals proved to be right first time. This meant that an initial order for production quantities could be placed early in July for delivery early August – in plenty of time to meet Triumph’s request.

“Triumph Motorcycles were very impressed with the performance of PWI on this project,” said David Lakin, Triumph’s Purchasing Manager, “though now we’ve seen that seals can be developed and produced this quickly, we’ll expect the same service on all of our future orders!”

Following its exceptional performance on this project, Triumph Motorcycles invited PWI to work on a new rotary lip seal to be used in the rear suspension strut of two current models. Once again, PWI was able to maintain its reputation for speed by supplying a quotation and samples within a fourteen-day window.

“We know that, in today’s manufacturing industry, requirements change rapidly and deadlines are always tight,” said Rick Treharne, Managing Director of PWI. “We believe that, with our experience and expertise, our access to the best and latest materials, and our in-house design, testing and manufacturing facilities, we are better placed than any other seal supplier to meet these challenges.”